Angie's List layoffs

Dateline: Thu 08 Nov 2007

Angie's List, the "little" Indianapolis-based company that helps consumers find good service providers for a fee, has grown so dramatically this year that it recently laid off about 30 people, most of them in sales.

"It was a head-count reduction," said CEO and co-founder of Angie's List Bill Oesterle. "At one point, we were up to 400 people; we had grown 100 percent this year. We shifted to commission sales, and some people just weren't making it."

In the advertisting sales area, Oesterle says, the staff had grown from 20 to 120 people. The total number of employees at the company is now 360, he said.

Angie's List is now in 128 markets across the nation, Oesterle said. It was founded by Angie Hicks and Bill Oesterle. Here's a June press releast from DePauw University, where Hicks graduated, which quotes Star biz columnist John Ketzenberger on the company's "explosive growth."

"Calling Hicks' company 'wildly successful,' Ketzenberger notes that Angie's List 'recently raised another $5 million from its existing investors and $3.7 million from a bond issue. It will use that money to fuel more of the explosive growth that has seen the company go from 33 cities to 124 since January 2006.'

According to the article, Angie's List remains a private company and prefers it that way. At that writing, expansion in Europe was anticipated.

Thanks to the tipster who let me know about the layoffs. If there is more to this story, please weigh in.